Spatial developments of EU agriculture in the post-war period: The case of wheat and tobacco

This article analyses the intertemporal development of the regional and spatial distribution of agricultural production in the territory of the EC-9. The analysis is based on a unique set of data: the analysed territory has been divided into 88 regions and data from these regions over a period of more than 40 years (1950/53-1993/96) are used. Different methods are applied to analyse the developments: maps and the skewness of distribution (coefficient of Gini) are combined with rank correlation (coefficient of Spearman), the calculation of the centre of gravity, and spatial autocorrelation (Moran's I). These methods are applied to two crops, wheat and tobacco. The results of the analyses of wheat cultivation indicate that the regional concentration has remained more or less unchanged, while the spatial concentration has decreased considerably. The centre of gravity has moved 600 km to the north-west. The research results for tobacco cultivation show an increasing regional concentration, combined with a stable or decreasing spatial concentration. The centre of gravity has moved 600 km to the south-east.